


Homesteading for Outlaws

by alliancedogtags



Series: Homeward Bound [2]
Category: Red Dead Redemption
Genre: Campfires, M/M, Pining Arthur, Pre-Relationship, arthur got those butterflies (charles does too)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-16
Updated: 2019-01-16
Packaged: 2019-10-11 02:14:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17437970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alliancedogtags/pseuds/alliancedogtags
Summary: in a moment of downtime, arthur and charles discuss a future.





	Homesteading for Outlaws

**Author's Note:**

> read this before or after scars but know it's in that arthur lives au!! i just really wanted to make a fic that was just. they got what they wanted in the au!!

     “So much money in Blackwater.”

     It’s spoken into night, a last thought that had crossed his mind, tired from a long ride. Just one little detail that had been hovering at the back of his mind like the clouds rolling over the plains, rich with electricity and rumbling off on the horizon, just a threat looming there. So many questions he had. So many questions that he hadn’t asked, and didn’t know if he even should. Something had happened in Blackwater, though he didn’t know what had even gone down, his head down with Hosea’s as they put together an even bigger score to be had. But that had been Dutch - always eager to do every job, wanting to bring back armfuls of gold to a camp filled with lost souls and once-orphans, to be the knot that tied them together. Instead, they’d ended up like this, living in excuses of canvas tents, tucked up in the cold of Horseshoe, no matter how beautiful. Arthur had thought of that now, laying on his back with an arm under his head beside the fire he’d started while Charles cared for the horses. 

     Charles now sat next to him, close enough that when Arthur lifted his free hand to rest on his own belly, his elbow bumped Charles’ hip. Just close enough to touch - but those boundaries were there, digging up the strangest feeling in his belly. When he opened his eyes, Charles was looking down at him.

     “If it was good money,” Charles replied, turning his attention back to where he was cleaning his hunting knife in his lap. “Felt like bein’ fed lies.”

     “Dutch got it, s’posedly.” Arthur watched the bits of ember float into the sky, listening to the hiss and snap of the fire beside them. “Now, ain’t ever been the one to doubt Dutch, but I wonder.”

     “Of course.” For a moment that comfortable silence fell, Arthur watching the sparks fly into the sky as he listened to the sound of cloth on steel and the sound of night critters moving about in the trees distantly. There was a peace in it, being near someone that he trusted so much, trusted enough to let down that on guard tension that worked knots in his shoulders that he couldn’t quite get out. Charles had that relaxed air about him. Hell, Arthur had nearly dozed off again, had he not heard the low rumble of the man’s voice.

      “What’s that?”

      “I asked what you’d do,” Charles replied, sticking the point of his knife in the ground, before adjusting and turning, moving so he lay down and mirrored Arthur, a comfortable distance between them. Felt nice, just getting to laze about again. “Y’know. With money like that.”

     “Hell, I ain’t much of a dreamin’ man, Charles,” Arthur replied, lifting a hand to run his fingers over his own jawline, rough with fresh stubble. When he did, his elbow bumped Charles again, but if he was bothered by it, Charles didn’t say. “Not many men in this line of work who get to be.”

     “You must think I’m a right fool to believe that,” Charles replied strongly, coaxing a laugh out of Arthur. “Thinkin’ like that’s the only thing keepin’ us alive.”

     “You got me.” Arthur thought for a moment, nothing but the silence between the two of them and the snapping fire. “Hell, where d’you even start with that money?”

     “A home,” Charles said, lifting a hand up and closing it, thumb extended, pointed towards the sky as though he were blocking out the stars. “Where would you go?”

     “The mountains. I’d head straight towards the mountains. Don’t give a damn which ones.” Arthur thought for a moment, eyes absently moving to watch Charles’ hand where it held the stars. Nothing between it and them but wide open space. “Spent too much time in the desert, got burned. Sure, we tested our luck up there by Lake Isabella, but y’have to admit that there’s a certain charm to it. And I’m thinkin’ our luck is coming to an end in the plains. Mountains it is.”

     “Mountains it is,” Charles echoed, dropping his hand from the sky and back onto his chest, uncovering the vast expanse of peppered light above them. Were he a man spending time with proper knowledge, he may have started drawing out the constellations then and there. 

     Instead, he turned his head to look over at where Taima and Lady grazed a short distance off, the shine of the waxing moon lighting the blanket of color on Taima’s rump and catching the white of Lady’s socks and blaze when she’d move her head or lift her feet. Real serene thing it was, camping with the horses, their saddles off and stowed away, nothing holding them but the trust they’d return.

     “I want a ranch. One with a dog. I did as a kid, even before I bought Boadicea, you know?” He watched the faint shine of Lady’s white blaze vanish when she turned her head, grazing with her back to them now. “Horses are good animals. They just want to do their best for you as long as you want to do the same.”

     “Your horsemanship has always stood out.”

     That one surprised Arthur, turning his gaze away from the horses and to the man beside him. Charles had that honest look on his face, open and inviting, and for a brief moment Arthur felt himself stuck between a compliment and a pretty face.

      It took him a heartbeat to think again.

      “You’re the one talkin’.” Arthur offered up a grin, but had to turn his eyes away from that face of his, lit so lovely and tempting by the warm glow of the fire. Made him think back to nights around the campfire, women he’d loved and men he’d thought way too much about. “Lady comes in cold as a slab of glacier ice, takes forever to thaw out and get to trust. Then I catch that gal all over your pockets like you’re good friends.”

     “Your horse isn’t favoring me over you, if that’s what you’re hinting at,” Charles said, the deep rumble of a laugh following behind it. In the slightest adjustment, their shoulders bumped, making Arthur damn near jump. “Lady wouldn’t take a flake of hay from me even if she was starving when you first brought her here. You’ve helped her open up to attention.”

     “Maybe so.” There was a compliment in there, and Arthur felt it, blossoming warm and giddy in his chest. They’d called him a horseman before, but this was different. This was Charles - who was able to calm whatever horse he pleased, warmed right up to him, who had the background to make what he’d said sound even more sincere. He processed that for a moment, glancing back over at the pair of mares grazing beneath the moon. “What would you do, Charles?”

     “Same as you, I reckon,” Charles replied. The smallest movement over, so subtle that Arthur almost missed it, had their shoulders bumping and a warmth touching Arthur’s ears. “Turn Taima towards the setting sun and ride until I feel like I’ve left things behind.”

_ We could ride that way together. _

     “Maybe towards the mountains, too. I think you’re right on that one, Arthur.”

_ There’s room enough for the two of us. _

     “Maybe I’d come visit you,” Charles said, and when Arthur looked over, there was a warm smile on his face that did all sorts of funny things to him. “You’d be the one I wanted to stay in touch with.”

_ Maybe we could live together. _

     “I’d like that, y’know,” was all Arthur was able to say, unable to stop the full on grin tugging on his lips. “You’d always be a welcome guest.”

     He couldn’t stop thinking about the warmth of Charles’ shoulder against his, the way that the other man’s laugh was soft and breathy.

     Maybe he’d get that future, after all.


End file.
